The expression of your inner “nerd” can finally be released when Comic Con comes to town July 21 through July 26. For one special week in the summer, the San Diego Convention Center will be packed with comic book enthusiasts dressed up in elaborate costumes, along with celebrities, booths selling and giving away merchandise, premiers and “scream queens.”
Comic Con fans went into a frenzy on February 5 when tickets went on sale for a second time, according to the Official Comic Con International website (comic-con.org). Minutes before the tickets were released to the public, the website reached capacity and crashed. As frantic fans desperately clicked refresh hoping to be let in, the number of tickets available was quickly dropping. Sitting, staring, and frantically jabbing F5, wishing that they would be able to buy tickets before they sold out, was how many fans spent their Saturday morning.
For many fans, the little green frog on their computer screen just seemed to stare, mocking them for hours as they became furious with the Ticket Leap server that kept booting them out. In past years, Comic Con has had problems with servers crashing, so this year they upgraded to a larger server to sell tickets to the public. However, Ticket Leap had the same problems of just too many people visiting the site at the same time. Comic Con tickets sold out in just a matter of eight hours, according to the Official Comic Con International Website (comic-con.org).
Where else can you see the creator of the Simpsons, your favorite actor/actress, and previews of all new upcoming shows? All this is only possible at Comic Con. This convention is no longer just for comic book fans that want to spend the entire day flipping through boxes of comic books that seem to be miles long, but for any multimedia fanatic, according to the Official Comic Con Website (comic-con.org). Over the past few years, Comic Con has become more accessible to the general public with the integration of pop culture into this convention.
“Comic Con is one of my favorite things to do in the summer. It’s anything you can imagine under one roof. I would say it’s like a cult, but it’s really not just because there are so many different things to see and do,” said Sophomore Victoria Wheatley.
Fans attending Comic Con can expect to have no elbowroom walking through the main hall. Many convention goers must squeeze themselves through tight breaks in the sea of people to get to the destination at hand. According to a website dedicated to attendance records, last year’s Comic Con completely sold out, but also reached maximum capacity of 160 thousand guests, an overwhelmingly large number of bodies crammed into the Convention Center (icv2.com).
This convention also attracts some very interesting collectors, willing to pay top dollar for the rare and bizarre collectables sold at Comic Con. “There was this girl at Comic Con that bought Star Trek Spock Hormone Perfume. It is always so surprising to me that this stuff actually exists,” said Wheatley.
So whether you love comic books, want to catch a glimpse of the latest movies coming out, or just love dressing up in costume and releasing your inner nerd, Comic Con has something for everyone. The convention crowds may be overwhelmingly large, but that just adds to the fun of the Comic Con experience.